Newbery Reviews: old and new

Original cover

Ginger Pye, by Eleanor Estes   (1952)

 Jerry Pye is ten and Rachel Pye is nine.  They live with their parents in Cranbury, Connecticut, halfway between New York and Boston.  Their grandparents live close by with Uncle Bennie, who is their mother’s younger brother and is just three years old.   Both Jerry and Rachel have lively imaginations and ambitions.  Jerry wants to be a “rock man” (geologist).   Rachel wants to be a “bird man” (ornithologist) like their father.   Jerry is impulsive and has big ideas.  Rachel takes action and then worries that she’s done the right thing.

Current cover 

Jerry sets his heart on getting a dog and enlists Rachel in raising the funds to do it.   Ginger Pye the fox terrier becomes a beloved part of the family.   When Ginger goes missing everyone is bereft.  (Spoiler alert:  Ginger returns!)    

There’s enough dramatic tension to keep the story from becoming treacly-sweet.  There are some seamy characters.  In all, this is a warm family story set in a kinder, gentler era.  (The book was published in 1951. The text doesn’t state it, but one of the illustrations is a newspaper story dated 1919.  Cranbury is West Haven where Estes grew up and worked as a children’s librarian.)

Though the book was republished with contemporary cover art, the text still has Estes’ illustrations, which are very amateurish.  Why didn’t the publisher commission a professional artist in the first place?

Miracles on Maple Hill, by Virginia Sorenson (1957)

I remember reading this when I was in grade school but I mis-remembered the location.  All these years I’ve thought that Maple Hill was in Vermont but actually it’s in Pennsylvania. That surprised me but it didn’t diminish my enjoyment of the story.

Marly’s dad was a prisoner of war and returned to Pittsburgh jittery, prone to dark moods, and unable to work.  The war isn’t named.  Nor is Dad’s condition, though now we call it PTSD.    It would be best for Dad to have the peace and quiet of rural life for his recovery so the family opens up the long-shuttered country house where Marly’s mother spent childhood summers.   They arrive in late winter when the maple sugaring season has just begun.  Their genial neighbor Mr. Chris shows them how he taps the trees and boils the sap to make maple syrup.   “Your great-grandma used to say there is all outdoors in that smell,” he tells Marly. “She called it the first miracle when the sap came up.”

Dad stays in the country while Marly, brother Joe, and Mother return to Pittsburgh. They return for summer vacation to find that Dad is doing much better – not quite his old self, but on the way – another miracle.  It’s a glorious summer with adventures and discoveries.   They decide to stay and the children enroll in the local schools.  Mr. Chris ends up in the hospital but recovers (another miracle).  And then it is maple season again:  the cycle of seasons, the cycle of miracles.

The illustrations are by Beth and Joe Krush, one (well, two) of my favorite illustrators.  I love the detail of their line drawings.  (I can’t help wondering about the untold parts of the story: what was their income with neither parent working?  What did they do about their city house?  The rural town is somewhere northeast of Pittsburgh, but where, exactly?) 

When You Reach Me   (2010)

By Rebecca Stead

 Miranda is in sixth grade.  She and her mother live in an apartment in New York.  Sal’s been her best friend since they were little kids. When he gets punched by the kid across the street he shuts Miranda out, to her puzzled distress.  Meanwhile her mother is preparing to be a contestant on the $20,000 Pyramid. They’re both dreaming of what they can do with the prize money.  Then Miranda begins to receive cryptic notes: “I am coming to save your life, and my own.” Who is sending them and what do they mean?

The book was set in 1979 though it was published in 2009.  That reminds me of Sue Grafton’s Kinsey Milhone mysteries which are also deliberately set in pre-Internet days.  Whether the character is a New York 6^th grader or a California P.I., the extra effort to find out whatever it is without referring to Google or Wikipedia helps flesh out the story.  It also makes this a “contemporary historical” story that won’t get dated because it’s already set in the past.

Kids and adults note the references to A Wrinkle In Time, which is Miranda's favorite book.  The library copy has a science fiction spine label. I don’t think it’s quite sci fi – rather, just enough alternate reality to get the reader thinking.

New cover

I, Juan de Pareja   (1965)

By Elizabeth Borton de Trevino

I remember seeing this book at the library – my hometown library and all the libraries where I worked. The cover was odd and the text seemed dense. It just didn’t appeal to me.  In retrospect that’s an odd reaction because I have always enjoyed historical fiction, especially when it’s based on real people. 

Juan de Pareja tells his own story.  He is a Moor, born into slavery in 17^th century Spain. When his wealthy mistress dies he become the property of her cousin.  That cousin is Diego Velazquez, the premier portraitist of Spain and, indeed, of Europe.   As the tale unfolds we learn about the restrictions on slaves. They could not earn their own money. They could not practice trades outside of their masters’ establishments. Juan discovered he had talent as an artist but he could not legally exercise it. 

Original cover

Juan’s tone is measured and formal, perhaps because that’s how we think that people spoke centuries ago and also because he had to be careful of what he said, just as he had to watch what he did. Though Velazquez treated him fairly and eventually freed him (thus allowing Juan to be one of the studio apprentices), he was still his master’s subject.

The new edition features Enrico Arno’s cover illustration for the book. It depicts Juan and King Philip of Spain together painting a cross on Velazquez’s self-portrait. The king’s Hapsburg jaw (a famous congenital malformation) is obvious, now that I know about that part of history.

This Newbery winner has more appeal for adults than kids.